Barely 48 hours after two Supreme Court judges opted out of cases involving companies owned by the Ambani brothers, another judge of the apex court also recused himself from a case.
Barely 48 hours after two Supreme Court judges opted out of cases involving companies owned by the Ambani brothers, another judge of the apex court also recused himself from a case related to a high-profile business house.
Justice SH Kapadia, who will become the chief justice of India (CJI) in May, withdrew from the bench hearing a matter pertaining to a public offer made by the London-based Vedanta Group to buy additional stake in iron ore exporting firm Sesa Goa, saying he has invested in Sterlite Industries, which is a sister company.
However, there was more to his reason for opting out as became apparent when a bench headed by CJI KG Balakrishnan issued a notice to lawyer Prashant Bhushan, who has, in a magazine interview, criticised justice Kapadia for presiding over a Sterlite case earlier this year despite holding equity in the concern. Bhushan had also made ‘derogatory’ remarks about some of the judges in the interview.
The court had acted on a plea by senior lawyer Harish Salve that contempt action was needed against Bhushan, an associate of Committee on Judicial Accountability (COJA).
Salve, who represents Reliance Industries Limited in the gas dispute case, had drawn the court’s attention to Bhushan’s interview with the magazine Tehelka. He termed it derogatory, and said it has sullied the image of the judiciary. The court also issued notice to Tarun Tejpal, editor-in-chief of the magazine, and posted the matter for hearing before a bench not having justice Kapadia as its member.
Salve, who mentioned the contempt petition before the bench, said there was no need to go into the issue of shares held by the judge. He said the issue is getting worse and such statements should not be made by an advocate.
“It is the question of an institution,” he said adding “we can’t have people within the system throwing bricks at it.” In the earlier case related to Sterlite, justice Kapadia had disclosed his investment in the firm and asked the lawyers whether they had any objection to him hearing the matter. The reply was ‘no’, just as it was in the case of the Ambani gas dispute where the counsels did not object to justice RV Raveendran’s presence in the bench despite him holding shares in both brothers’ Reliance companies.
Justice Kapadia, who owns Rs25 lakh equity in different companies while his wife has investments in stock worth Rs19 lakh, opted out of Friday’s hearing even before the lawyers could open their arguments in a petition filed by a BSE broker Harinarayan Bajaj in 2007 seeking a stay on implementation of the public offer made by Vedanta Resources to buy 20% additional stake in Sesa Goa.
On Friday, as the matter came up for hearing, justice Kapadia asked, “Is this case related to Sesa Goa.” When the lawyers answered in the positive, he ordered “not before me”.
Market regulator Sebi had given its approval to Vedanta’s open offer to buy additional stake from the company’s shareholders and the Bombay high court in its interim order had refused to restrain Mitsui and its UK-based subsidiary Finsider International from selling or transferring stake in Sesa Goa. The apex court had also made Vedanta a party in the matter.
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